Tag: House of Yahweh

Bigamy charges against West Texas sect leader Yisrayl Hawkins were dismissed Thursday after the head of the House of Yahweh pleaded no contest to four cases involving child-labor violations, the Callahan County attorney announced.

The dismissal of the charges shocked Margo Hawkins, Yisrayl Hawkins’ 36-year-old daughter, who left the House of Yahweh when she was 22. “It’s a cult. They brainwash people,” she said.

A judge sentenced a religious sect’s elder to 30 years in prison for molesting an 11-year-old girl during a phony cervical cancer exam.

Hawkins has no medical training but used a gynecological medical instrument to examine the girl at a home in 2005, according to trial testimony. A former House of Yahweh member testified that Hawkins actually was worried the girl was not a virgin.

Yedidiyah Hawkins, 40, a House of Yahweh elder, was convicted Monday of aggravated sexual assault of a child. A judge will set the sentence, expected within 45 days. Hawkins earlier decided that he wanted a judge to assess the punishment if jurors found him guilty.

The sect’s leader, self-proclaimed prophet Yisrayl Hawkins, faces trial later this year on bigamy and child labor charges. He is accused of having more than 20 wives, performing polygamous weddings and forcing about 40 children to work jobs at his 44-acre compound in rural Clyde near Abilene.

Testimony from a 15-year-old girl revealed new details Friday about the allegations of sexual assault of a child by a House of Yahweh elder.

The girl, 11 at the time of the alleged assault, testified that her stepfather Yedidiyah Hawkins, 40, used a vaginal speculum — a medical instrument used by gynecologists — to perform an examination on her.

Yisrayl “Buffalo Bill” Hawkins’ popularity was not limited to Texas, or even the United States. For years his House of Yahweh sect was booming in the nation of Kenya, at least until his last doomsday prediction in September 2006, which ended up dooming the group’s success in the East African country.